Saturday, 12 July 2014

Sekhemka: Cause of Castle Ashby Fire a "Mystery"

It seems that the origin of the fire that on the eve of the Sekhemka sale gutted part of the Marquess of Northampton's home at Castle Ashby where the statue was first housed when it came to England remains a mystery.

Fire bosses at the scene said it was too early to say what had caused the fire. The estate office housed various different artefacts and memorabilia relating to the historic house. [...] Castle Ashby Estate declined to comment [...].

Is there a catalogue, does the estate retain any other objects brought
back from Egypt together with Sekhemka? What artefacts were lost in the
fire? Could the fire have originated with one of the "artefacts" contained in the collections? Until an investigation has been carried out we can only speculate.

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About Me

British archaeologist living and working in Warsaw, Poland. Since the early 1990s (or even longer) a primary interest has been research on artefact hunting and collecting and the market in portable antiquities in the international context and their effect on the archaeological record.

Abbreviations used in this blog

"coiney" - a term I use for private collector of dug up ancient coins, particularly a member of the Moneta-L forum or the ACCG

"heap-of-artefacts-on-a-table-collecting" the term rather speaks for itself, an accumulation of loose artefacts with no attempt to link each item with documented origins. Most often used to refer to metal detectorists (ice-cream tubs-full) and ancient coin collectors (Roman coins sold in aggregated bulk lots)